Soda Stream’s PR Win

Marketers advertising on the Super Bowl face two challenges. The main issue is breaking through the clutter during the game. The other challenge is getting PR attention in the days leading up to the event.

The PR battle isn’t easy. There are only so many news outlets and business writers. A newspaper has only one front page each day and can only fit a certain number of stories. There are dozens of Super Bowl advertisers fighting for coverage.

Soda Stream has deftly managed its PR this year and is getting enormous attention as a result. For a small advertiser, Soda Stream is getting disproportionate amount of coverage.

Soda Stream got off to a strong start when it announced in early January that it had signed Scarlett Johansson to be its spokesperson. This move provided a big boost for the brand. Johansson did a number of interviews discussing Soda Stream. Here is an example of the coverage:

Last weekend, Soda Stream was back in the news when it revealed that Fox had rejected its Super Bowl ad because it mentioned Coke and Pepsi by name. Daniel Birnbaum, CEO, announced the news and said he was shocked by the decision. He sputtered, “This is the kind of stuff that happens in China. I’m disappointed as an American.” You can read more about it here:

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2 Responses

The Kellogg Super Bowl Advertising Review focuses on the overall business impact of the Super Bowl ads by rating ads based on their ability to drive sales and build their brands.

What lengths are acceptable for an ad to go to drive sales? Soda Stream got in trouble for dissing its competitors, but I have another objection to the ad. Call me hopelessly idealistic, but I’d like to believe that ads could work for their brands without objectifying women. I’d like to believe that brands that resort to such tactics will eventually pay the price for their lack of integrity. That backlash will only happen if such portrayals are universally regarded as in poor taste. As an alumna, I’d like to encourage Kellogg to use its stature to push our cultural norms in a direction that respects all people. A start would be incorporating the negative (and positive) social impacts of ads in the Kellogg Super Bowl Advertising Review ranking criteria.

When I saw the Soda Stream ad, I thought of this video: The Sexy Lie: Caroline Heldman at TEDxYouth@SanDiego http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kMS4VJKekW8
Prof. Heldman explains that, with the dramatic increase in the number of ads that we see in a day, advertisers are increasingly relying on hyper-sexualization and violence to cut through the clutter.